Coroner investigating death of transgender teacher who killed herself after being outed chastises press for 'ill-informed bigotry'

The coroner investigating the death of a transgender primary school teacher who killed herself after being outed in newspapers has told the media they should be ashamed of themselves.

Addressing journalists at the inquest of Lucy Meadows, who killed herself in March, aged 32, the coroner, Michael Singleton, said: "To the members of the press, I say shame. Shame on all of you."

He chastised the press for the "ill-informed bigotry" in press coverage of Meadows after she began her transition from male to female over the Christmas holidays.

Meadows' gender assignment became national news after her local newspaper in Accrington got hold of a letter from the school to parents informing them that one of their teachers, then known as Nathan Upton, would be returning after the Christmas break as a woman called Lucy Meadows.

Turning to Ruth Smith, Meadows' former wife, who gave evidence at the inquest, Singleton said he hoped those journalists present would write "sympathetic and sensitive" reports of the hearing. But, he added: "I do not hold my breath."

The coroner said he had done some research into the media reports about Meadows. "I have to say, I was appalled."

He noted that she had written to the Press Complaints Commission (PCC) on 3 January to complain about "harassment from the press" and in particular, a column written by Richard Littlejohn in the Daily Mail on 20 December.

In a piece headlined "He's not only in the wrong body … he's in the wrong job", Littlejohn asked whether anyone had thought of the "devastating effect" on the pupils of Meadows' change of gender.

The PCC carried out an investigation and two months later, on 11 March, the Daily Mail offered to remove Littlejohn's article from its website, as well as a photograph of Meadows' wedding to Smith in February 2009.

Singleton said he considered the Daily Mail's gesture to be token at best, given what he described as the character assassination the paper had carried out on Meadows, which he said "sought to humiliate and ridicule" her.

"It seems to be that nothing has been learned from the Leveson inquiry."

He said he would be writing to the culture secretary, Maria Miller, to urge the government to implement the recommendations of the Leveson report in order to prevent a similar suicide happening again.

Singleton quoted rule 43 of the Coroners Rules 1984, which gives coroners the power to write a report to a person or organisation where the coroner believes that actions should be taken to prevent future deaths.

"Lucy Meadows was not somebody who had thrust herself into the public limelight. She was not a celebrity. She had done nothing wrong," Singleton told the inquest at Blackburn register office. "Her only crime was to be different. Not by choice but by some trick of nature. And yet the press saw fit to treat her in the way that they did."

The coroner conceded that Meadows had made no reference to the media intrusion in one of the suicide notes she left in her house before she killed herself by carbon monoxide poisoning. He read out one note in full, in which Meadows detailed her problems.

Original article by Helen Pidd of the Guardian: http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2013/may/28/lucy-meadows-coroner-press-shame

i think bullying someone till they feel they cannot live anymore should be the same punishment as someone would get for cutting them to death with a 1000 cuts ... some of use that have been bullied have cut ourselves because its less painful consentrating on the cuts than the thoughts of what the ppl who do this sort of thing think of us

its high time bullying was properly address in the court of law ... and that law should not be limited by age ... ppl like Richard Littlejohn was probs the schools asshole who shits on ppl who are different to him and clearly the lesson needs to be taught for a grown man to act like hes 10 in a play ground ... why didnt the daily mail sack him for gross mis-conduct ... im sure miss meadows is a customer what would the boss of asda for eg do if i worked on the till and spouted that sort of stuff to miss meadows at the till and made sure everyone in the store heard what was said im sure id be walked out the store and told i was band from ever entering it and sacked

i sure as hell wont even tuch that newspaper and make it a point every time i see it why i wont and i def wont be going on there site ... i mean thats 2 customers they lost right there wonder how many others